BF 1272 .C75 Copy 2 THE CHICAGO ADDRESS. Signs of the Times: From the Standpoint of a Scientist. AN ADDRESS DELIVFRED AT THE FIRST METHODIST CHURCH, APRIL 26, l8$X UNDER THE AUSPICES OV THE WESTERN SOCIETY FOR PSYCHICAL RESEARCH. Prof. ELLIOTT COTES, M. D., MEMBER OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES; OF THE LONDOK SOCIETY FOR PSYCHICAL RESEARCH*, OF THE THEOSOPH- ICAL SOCIETY OF INDIA, ETC., FTC. "Per aspera ai/ astral CHICAGO: RELIGIO-PHILOSOPKICAL PUBLISHING HOUSE, 1S89. LjL L '^<r:^A i (^r^^U^l***-^ f~ THE CHICAGO ADDRESS. Signs of the Times: From the Standpoint of a Scientist. AN ADDRESS DELIVERED AT THE FIRST METHODIST CHURCH, APRIL 26, l8SS, UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE ff ■ — BV 7 Prof. ELLIOTT COCJES, M. D., MEMBER OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES; OF THE LONDON SOCIETY FOR PSYCHICAL RESEARCH; OF THE THEOSOPH- ICAL SOCIETY OF INDIA, ETC., ETC. "Per aspera ad astra" CHICAGO: RELIGIO-PHILOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING HOUSE. 1SS9. Copyright, 1888. By Keligio-Philosophical Publishing House. Gift Carnegie Muse-Li a Pittsfouri DEDICATION. TO COL. JOHN C. BUNDY, Editor of the Religio-Philosophical Journal, a fearless defender of the faith and leading Exponent of True Spiritualism, these Pages are Inscribed with high Regard b Y THE AUTHOR. PUBLISHER'S NOTE. Professor Coues' Address originally appeared in the Reli- gio-Philosophical Journal of May 12, 1888, from the Author's notes. It was immediately issued from the Journal's print in Light, the leading English Spiritualistic periodical. Both these editions being practically exhausted, and the demand for the Address continuing, it is now republished in book form, from revised manuscript furnished by the Author. In its pre- sent form it is the only edition authorized by Professor Coues. THE Signs of The Times From the Standpoint of a Scientist, Ladies and Gentlemen: Responding to the flattering invitation of the Western So- ciety for Psychical Research, I have come from afar to address you to-night on a subject that has the most vivid interest. I congratulate myself on the privilege of speaking to this cultur- ed and thoughtful audience, assembled in earnest to hear what poor words may do even scanty justice to the Signs of the Times in which you and I take living part. I wish to speak — not as the special advocate of this or that school of thought ; not as an iconoclast of any established belief; neither as a Spir- itualist, nor as a TheosojDhist, nor as one wedded to any doc- trine—but simply as one thinking human being may address another when confident that his theme concerns them both alike. I should be guilty of intellectual recreancy did I fail to speak as I truly think; and I beg for my thoughts the same kindly 2 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES and sympathetic hearing that I would give to yours were our places reversed. I would not that this church should resound with words alone. There is another atmosphere about us than the air we breathe, a subtle element to stir, that an inner sense may catch its rhythmical pulsation and be moved in close ac- cord. THE WOMAN QUESTION. And the first among the Signs of the Times is the "Woman Question." That is, indeed, not only first, but also last, and al- a ways. This is sign whose full significance we shall see before I have done. And second, Spiritualism, well-named the "Main- stay of Religion and the Despair of Science." And third, Psy- chical Research, to which we turn wistfully for light upon the deeper problems of life. There is needed no Theosophy to discern in these three things a trinity of force that needs but some fulcrum on which to turn the world. These are the Signs . of the Times we shall question to-night, whether they be only surface ripples to pass with the idle winds, or whether, indeed, such tremors portend a violent upheaval of ground considered secure. Never yet has a throe of nature come without fair war- ning. Nothing is born to live without premonitory pains. No I, alarmist who have faced the facts too many years for that I But history will fail to repeat itself, and such failure would mean that eternal cycles of time should swerve from an appoint- ed course ; that human progress should not be an orderly unfold- ing of man's destiny, but a spasmodic struggle against fate —history fails us, I repeat, if men now living do not witness, on the turn of this century, greater changes than any of us know as yet; do not experience in their own lives the full cumulative effect of spiritual and material forces which have been in silent operation for the past six hundred years. That is the law. That is the Law of Karma, escape from which the world has never known. The progress of evolution, of development, is never in one is it is straight line. It revolutionary; cyclical; it returns upon FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 3 itself. Yet never back to its starting point, but always like a spiral coiling higher and higher ; and every completed turn of the coils is marked by changes that seem to be catastrophes if viewed alone, but appear harmonious and necessary when seen in the light of all that has gone before. Nay, more ; the greater revolutions of the wheels of Fate are ablaze with prophetic fire for those whose eyes can bear the light of an EzekieFs vision. For the causes of yesterday become the effects of to-day, and these the causes of to-morrow in turn. This law remains^ whether days, or years, or centuries are taken into account. It is the cycle of 600 years that I first call to your attention to ac- count for what goes on to-day. This is not merely a political cycle of such length ; not a round-up of human history only; but a far deeper and more necessary turning-point, a very astronom- ical period in the life of our planet. It is hard to realize this; hard to bring it home to our thoughts and feelings, that now is one of these turning points. Yet this is historically true; for revolutions —by some called revelations— have not failed to re- cur for twenty-four hundred years at least, at intervals of six hundred years. At each one of these periods the figure of a man has stood as the visible embodiment and very incarnation of the spirit of his time, the index of mighty issues of the ful- ness of time. THE NAROS OR CYCLE OP 600 YEARS. There are students of mystical lore, especially among the strange beings who call themselves Rosicrucians, who trace the naroses or cycles of 600 years much further back. I will be con- tent to mention but four, each in the briefest word : In the year 1222 one of the greatest conquerors the world has ever seen was at the hight of his glory ; the great Mongolian chieftain, styled the u 1' perfect warrior, had overrun the Eastern Continent and es- tablished his rule from what is now Turkey to far Cathay- sole monarch by right of might over millions of men left living witnesses of a million slain. The night of the dark ages brood- ed over Europe, while the heel of the conqueror stamped on the 4 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES neck of Asia. Five years later Genghis Khan, personification of brute force, was mouldering dust ; and conjunctions of plan- ets in the skies, those strange portents from heaven to earth, at- tested the turn of the cycle from whose initial point the spirit of light was to struggle with Europe for such ascendancy as we behold to-day, and take 600 years to reach her zenith. Who or what before Genghis Khan? In the year 622 — ex- actly 600 years before —the founder of Moslem was 40 years old. Then occurred the Hegira, and the vinitial impulse was given to one of the ten great religions of the world. Millions of men have gone to the Mountain, or the Mountain has come to them, under the banner of Mahomet, whose coffin has hung in the air ever since for millions of believers, the while that like countless throngs have crossed the thread of Alsirat to the Paradise of the Blest. Unwind now the coil yet another 600 years. Need my Chris- tian friends be told that the Star of Bethlehem had risen? The wise men had worshiped ; the shadow of the cross was immi- nent on Calvary. The God -made man returned to his Maker; and by his life was kindled in the hearts of men a light never to be quenched, ever to flash athwart a world with growing splendor. v Uncoil the thread once more —yet another turn of the Wheel of Life that spins the web for 600 years. If there be a Buddhist here to-night, let him think of the time when his Lord Buddha brought from heaven the Light of Asia, that should burn through the ages till one-third of the human race should have caught its gentle, patient ray. Verily hath the spirit been left without a witness never ! That spirit, omnipotent, for weal or woe, is not for a day, but forever. Great incarnate Avatars or messengers speak to races and nations and epochs. Lesser angels or demons, as the case may be, speak to us every one, every day and hour, if so be it we can hear the voice of the silence within the heart.